Playboy: Santelli's "Tea Party" rant pre-planned?

[Balta1701]

Playboy magazine, of all places (all the newspapers dead?), does some investigative work on CNBC anchor Rick Santelli's anti-Obama rant from a couple weeks ago, and alleges it was part of a much larger, pre-planned PR campaign against the president's policies. (Link is hopefully SFW, although I have ads blocked I can't say for sure, and the address is playboy.com, if anyone is watching what sites you visit you might want to avoid it)

Let’s go back to February 19th: Rick Santelli, live on CNBC, standing in the middle of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, launches into an attack on the just-announced $300 billion slated to stem rate of home foreclosures: “The government is promoting bad behavior! Do we really want to subsidize the losers’ mortgages?! This is America! We're thinking of having a Chicago tea party in July, all you capitalists who want to come down to Lake Michigan, I'm gonna start organizing."

 

Almost immediately, the clip and the unlikely "Chicago tea party" quote buried in the middle of the segment, zoomed across a well-worn path to headline fame in the Republican echo chamber, including red-alert headlines on Drudge.

 

Within hours of Santelli's rant, a website called ChicagoTeaParty.com sprang to life. Essentially inactive until that day, it now featured a YouTube video of Santelli’s “tea party” rant and billed itself as the official home of the Chicago Tea Party. The domain was registered in August, 2008 by Zack Christenson, a dweeby Twitter Republican and producer for a popular Chicago rightwing radio host Milt Rosenberg—a familiar name to Obama campaign people. Last August, Rosenberg, who looks like Martin Short's Irving Cohen character, caused an outcry when he interviewed Stanley Kurtz, the conservative writer who first "exposed" a personal link between Obama and former Weather Undergound leader Bill Ayers. As a result of Rosenberg’s radio interview, the Ayers story was given a major push through the Republican media echo chamber, culminating in Sarah Palin’s accusation that Obama was “palling around with terrorists.” That Rosenberg’s producer owns the “chicagoteaparty.com” site is already weird—but what’s even stranger is that he first bought the domain last August, right around the time of Rosenburg’s launch of the “Obama is a terrorist” campaign. It’s as if they held this “Chicago tea party” campaign in reserve, like a sleeper-site. Which is exactly what it was.

 

...

Even Facebook pages dedicated to a specific city "tea party" events, supposedly written by people connected only by a common emotion, obviously conformed to the same style. It was as if they were part of a multi-pronged advertising campaign planned out by a professional PR company. Yet, on the surface, they pretended to have no connection. The various sites set up their own Twitter feeds and Facebook pages dedicated to the Chicago Tea Party movement. And all of them linked to one another, using it as evidence that a decentralized, viral movement was already afoot. It wasn't about partisanship; it was about real emotions coming straight from real people.

 

While it’s clear what is at stake for the Koch oligarch clan and their corporate and political allies—fighting to keep the hundreds of billions in surplus profits they’ve earned thanks to pro-rich economic policies over the past 30 years—what’s a little less obvious is Santelli’s link to all this. Why would he (and CNBC) risk their credibility, such as it is, as journalists dispensing financial information in order to act as PR fronts for a partisan campaign?

 

As noted above, Santelli’s contract with CNBC runs out in a few months. His 10 years with the network haven’t been remarkable, and he’ll enter a brutal downsizing media job market. Thanks to the “tea party” campaign, as the article notes, Santelli’s value has suddenly soared. If you look at the scores of blogs and fake-commenters on blogs (for example, Daily Blog, a slick new blog launched in January which is also based in Chicago) all puff up Santelli like he’s the greatest journalist in America, and the greatest hero known to mankind. Daily Bail, like so much of this “tea party” machine, is “headquartered nearby” to Santelli, that is, in Chicago. With Odom, the Sam Adams Alliance, and the whole “tea party” nexus: “Rick, this message is to you. You are a true American hero and there are no words to describe what you did today except your own. Headquartered nearby, we will be helping the organization in whatever way possible.”

 

It’s not difficult to imagine how Santelli hooked up with this crowd. A self-described “Ayn Rand-er,” one of Santelli's colleagues at CNBC, Lawrence Kudlow, played a major role in both FreedomWorks and the Club for Growth.

 

So today’s protests show that the corporate war is on, and this is how they’ll fight it: hiding behind “objective” journalists and “grassroots” new media movements. Because in these times, if you want to push for policies that help the super-wealthy, you better do everything you can to make it seem like it’s “the people” who are “spontaneously” fighting your fight.

[knightni]

Here's a SFW link:

 

http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2009/02/rick-...llis-faux-rant/

[Texsox]

typical liberal media trying to keep the real news away from the American public.

[mr_genius]

I have bad news for you guys, all these little 'precious moments' such as the kid that asks Blago to play a game of hoops during a press conference or the lady at a Obama rally that touched everyone’s heart... is all set up.

 

I know, I’m sure you guys are devastated.

 

[NorthSideSox72]

I have bad news for you guys, all these little 'precious moments' such as the kid that asks Blago to play a game of hoops during a press conference or the lady at a Obama rally that touched everyone’s heart... is all set up.

 

I know, I’m sure you guys are devastated.

I had no idea!

 

Say it ain't so, joe genius!!!

 

[bmags]

Santelli isn't a politician though.

[southsider2k5]

Ah yes, if you can't kill the message, kill the messenger.

[bmags]

I don't think anyone is saying that, but you all, so worried your objectivity in the news, it is considered poor ethics to use what you 'report' on to better your personal check book. WSJ doesn't allow their journalists to invest in the stock market to avoid conflicts of interest that happened with one reporter in the 90s. How are we to believe Santelli's advice in the future isn't just to help out his new business ventures?

[mr_genius]

I don't think anyone is saying that, but you all, so worried your objectivity in the news, it is considered poor ethics to use what you 'report' on to better your personal check book. WSJ doesn't allow their journalists to invest in the stock market to avoid conflicts of interest that happened with one reporter in the 90s. How are we to believe Santelli's advice in the future isn't just to help out his new business ventures?

 

there's really no such thing as objective journalism within major news casts anymore, besides maybe The News Hour with Jim Lehrer.

 

i really don't see what the difference is if this guy planned his outburst ahead of time or just did it on a random whim. you would object to his rant either way correct?

Edited March 2, 2009 by mr_genius

[bmags]

So you complain ad nauseum about how slanted and biased the news is giving really abstract evidence, and when faced with a pretty ridiculous example of a news employee trying to use his platform to line his own pockets you look the other way. I have no doubt Santelli believed everything he said, but now you have to wonder what isn't also lined with a reason to get people to his new media.

 

You use objecting to his rant in a poor way. I don't agree with Santelli, but I didn't really care about it. I don't like any of the screaming money people, or CNN's Bashir. To me, this is the equivelant of using your reporting of stocks to help manipulate your portfolio, or, I guess a common story now, to do a report on all the new Obama merchandise, when you were featuring products you are selling.

[mr_genius]

when faced with a pretty ridiculous example of a news employee trying to use his platform to line his own pockets you look the other way.

 

I expect such actions, so I am not 'looking the other way'. I saw his speech and didn't care about it. The current state of news journalism has desensitized me to lousy reporting. I don't even start discussions about the media anymore. At times I might reply to a post about the 'anti-Democrat' MSM, but that's about the extent to it recently.

Edited March 2, 2009 by mr_genius

[southsider2k5]

So you complain ad nauseum about how slanted and biased the news is giving really abstract evidence, and when faced with a pretty ridiculous example of a news employee trying to use his platform to line his own pockets you look the other way. I have no doubt Santelli believed everything he said, but now you have to wonder what isn't also lined with a reason to get people to his new media.

 

You use objecting to his rant in a poor way. I don't agree with Santelli, but I didn't really care about it. I don't like any of the screaming money people, or CNN's Bashir. To me, this is the equivelant of using your reporting of stocks to help manipulate your portfolio, or, I guess a common story now, to do a report on all the new Obama merchandise, when you were featuring products you are selling.

 

Or getting jobs in the Presidential administration after just having reported glowingly on it?

[Rex Kickass]

Or getting jobs in the Presidential administration after just having reported glowingly on it?

 

Hey if it works for Tony Snow...

[bmags]

Or getting jobs in the Presidential administration after just having reported glowingly on it?

 

Maybe, but I really think journalists are going to have to be forgiven, whatever new medium employs reporters, for what they have to do for money the next few years. Typically, going into PR would pretty much end your career. But, when the entire industry is collapsing, people are going to try and get employed. Reporting on politics has given these people a lot of connections over the years, you can't expect them to stay at the LA Times with the way Zell is running them into the ground.

 

I agree that isn't really transparent, but these people won't find jobs in their own industry, it's pretty understandable. As long as when they were a journalist they were pretty transparent.

[Cknolls]

http://www.cnbc.com/id/29471026

[bmags]

That seemed to be more of a response to Gibbs besides the first question.

 

Has this 'tea party' thing been a common phrase? Is there a history to it?

 

Because it's too strange of a coincidence for all that stuff to happen.

[Balta1701]

Has this 'tea party' thing been a common phrase? Is there a history to it?

There was one of them in Boston a few hundred years ago.

[bmags]

There was one of them in Boston a few hundred years ago.

 

that's not what I meant, is there a high probability that these web domains would be bought in August out of the sheer coincidence that this phrase is often used to show rebellion by, say, conservatives in a dem. administration.

 

Honestly, what are the odds on that, it doesn't make sense.

[bmags]

is there record when domains are sold between two parties?

[Balta1701]

that's not what I meant, is there a high probability that these web domains would be bought in August out of the sheer coincidence that this phrase is often used to show rebellion by, say, conservatives in a dem. administration.

 

Honestly, what are the odds on that, it doesn't make sense.

It is ridiculously low, and yes, there are records kept of who purchases/owns web sites. That's how this report came to be. Without that there'd be nothing backing it up.

[RockRaines]

Ah yes, if you can't kill the message, kill the messenger.

There was a message in there somewhere? If there was, who would take it seriously?

[Balta1701]

There was a message in there somewhere? If there was, who would take it seriously?

The people who believe that the stockbrokers and the people who own the most stock are representative of the rest of the country.

 

AKA the news media.

[southsider2k5]

The people who believe that the stockbrokers and the people who own the most stock are representative of the rest of the country.

 

AKA the news media.

 

Why do they matter? They just control the lions share of the nations workforce. If they think things are getting worse, what is the worst that could happen?

[Balta1701]

Why do they matter? They just control the lions share of the nations workforce. If they think things are getting worse, what is the worst that could happen?

Thankfully those are the smartest guys in the room and they never screw things up.

[Balta1701]

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

Daily Show Full Episodes

Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor

Joke of the Day

 

John Stewart was absolute money last night. Seems that Santelli had actually scheduled to do the daily show last night, but last Friday, right before Playboy published their story, Santelli canceled on him. So we get a nice 8 minute analysis of how solid and wonderful CNBC is. Hilarity ensues.